Self-evident

On page 393 of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy has written: Have no fear that matter can ache, swell, or be inflamed as the result of a law of any kind, when it is self-evident that matter can have no pain nor inflammation.

How interesting, that term, self-evident. 

I like the story of how that term came to be in the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America.  The initial draft, by Thomas Jefferson, read "We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable, that all men are created equal, and endowed with certain inalienable rights, and that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."  Franklin's revisions were slight but crucial.  He struck out "sacred and undeniable" and wrote, instead, "self-evident." (p. 183 Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin by Jill Lepore).

Julie Swannell